Original Content: Tools & TemplatesSince TICAL is a portal, most of the resources you'll find in the database live elsewhere on the web. However, TICAL has created the following original content for use by our registered members.
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Tools & Templates: Curriculum Integration | ||||||||||||||||||||
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| California Middle School Standards Matricies and Electronic Learning Resources (ELRs) This Excel® template is designed to help administrators and teachers quickly find an ELR by English-Language Arts standard as well as providing you an easy-to-view representation of the standards. The California Learning Resource Network (CLRN) has gathered several ELRs. All of these have been reviewed for effectiveness and relevance to their appropriate grade level and content standards. This template will help you integrate technology in a standards-based curriculum. | |
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| High School Diploma Student Course Plan This Excel® template is designed as a keep track sheet for students in alternative high school diploma programs. These programs include Adult Education, Continuation, Independent Study, and home schooling. | |
Tools & Templates: Data-Driven Decision Making |
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| Data Analysis with Excel Need to collect and analyze California Standards Test data? Check out these easy-to-use templates developed by Michael Nunn, consultant with CTAP 11, Los Angeles County Office of Education. | |
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| Dropping Out of School is One of the Key Social Challenges of Our Time This pdf matrix lays out what the California Department of Education (CDE) is currently doing and planning on doing to improve dropout reduction in California. Written by the Middle & High School Improvement Office and Educational Options Office under the Secondary, Postsecondary, & Adult Leadership Division, the matrix is designed to provide you with specific programs offered by the CDE and research linking to additional information including locations on the CDE website for best practices, dropout prevention, and much more! | |
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| Google Form Template: Classroom Walkthrough and Observation Form Courtesy of Kern Kelly and Fred Johnston,use this form from any computer or PDA with Internet connectivity to evaluate teachers' lessons, pedagogy, and classroom climate. Feel free to modify to fit your district's standards. All data will be recorded in a Google Spreadsheet and a second sheet has been created to quickly printout the results for the teachers and your records. Simply use the "hide column(s)" function in Excel to only show the specific teacher you want a printout for. | |
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| Google Form Template: Teacher self-assessment on the National Education Technology Standards (NETS·T) Survey your teachers to determine how well they perceive their use of technology in the design and implementation of their lessons. | |
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| How to use Electronic Learning Assessment Resources (ELAR) Web site This tool was designed by the ELAR staff to assist you in navigating the Web site. It was prepared for beginning to advanced users of data-driven resources in hopes of helping you make decisions based on data. This document is broken down by concept, where to find the resource on the site, and a direct URL link. | |
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| Identify Program Elements to Improve Student Achievement (AOP Form) The Analysis of Process (AOP) worksheet will assist you in the identification of elements of a school program that can help you improve student achievement. This tool is referenced in the article "A Data-Driven Organization's Approach to Assessing The Quality of Program Delivery" written by Jim Cox and available online in Portical's Expert Opinion area. A template for the worksheet and a sample are available in HTML and PDF formats. | |
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| Instructional Program Summary This Excel® template is designed to help administrators determine the instructional hours being spent in each content area. This template will also graph the data so you can see how content areas (Language Arts, Reading, Math, Science, and Social Studies) are prioritized by your teachers. | |
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| Just for the Kids-California (JFTK-CA) Best Practices This 15-minute presentation will explain the many resources and specific practices collected from high performing school across the country found on the free, online data and school improvement system called Just for the Kids-California. You will be walked through the Best Practices area of the Web site and even be shown how to assess your own school, district, and/or classroom to assist you in data-driven decision making. | |
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| Organize and Chart Student Scores An Excel template that can be used to enter and analyze student assessment data. For more information on how this template was first developed and used, see Using Technology to Make Sense of Data by Dan Ryder, here on the Portical web site. | |
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| Survey Templates Ready to Administer Using Google Forms These Microsoft Excel files were created to provide you quick access to surveys you can administer in your school or district using Google Forms (a subset of Google Docs). You can either obtain a direct copy of the survey to send to your participants immediately OR you can load the original spreadsheet into Google Docs and create the survey from the spreadsheet. | |
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| Track Legislative Bills and Information The Official California Legislative Information Web site is maintained by the Legal Counsel of California. This downloadable tip sheet,available as a PDF, will assist you in locating and tracking legislative bills and information for California. | |
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| Tracking Arkansas Legislative Bills and Information TICAL Arkansas cadre member Phoebe Bailey developed this simple step sheet to help you take advantage of the General Assembly web site to locate and track pertinent legislation. | |
Tools & Templates: Financial Planning |
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| New Programs Funding Calculator 2006-2007 was a great year for funding special projects, that is if you know the strings attached, how the funds are calculated and if you qualify. How does an administrator figure out what monies are available this year for technology projects? Here is a great resource created by our friends in the Arvin Union School District, Bakersfield, CA. Calculations, explanations and more can be found on this user friendly spreadsheet. Impress you business department with the amount of knowledge gained from this resource. Knowledge is power. Post 2006-2007, use this as a template for creating your own customized version with current year data. | |
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| Technology Funding Sources for Schools Looking for technology funding? This page offers a few key links to help you know what technology dollars are available from government, foundation, and corporate sources. | |
Tools & Templates: Operations and Maintenance |
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| Average Enrollment and Projection Template for K-3 Class Size Reduction Are you an elementary school administrator wondering how close the classrooms are from full capacity? This Excel® template will help you determine your school's compliance towards Class Size Reduction by calculating average daily enrollment (if your Student information System does not). It will also project the number of days that are needed to move students from one class to another in order to become compliant. This template will save you hours and will lower your anxiety in meeting requirements. | |
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| Bell Schedule and Instructional Minutes These scheduling templates contributed by cadre member Chris York will help create your bell schedule whether you are starting from scratch or already have an existing schedule to work with. Each Excel® template automatically calculates the passing or recess time per day, the amount of time school is in session per day, and the total annual minutes of instructional time. You can ensure you are meeting the state’s or district’s requirements. The template also gives you the option to enter your articulation/collaboration schedule and minimum day schedule. | |
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| Internet and Media Publishing Consent and Waiver Form These templates in both Spanish and English can be downloaded, modified, and printed to obtain parental consent for students who publish their work and/or photos and videos online. A signed consent form allows the school or district to also publish photographs and videos of students. | |
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| Software Implementation Toolkit In this 15-minute narrated presentation, Jason Borgen summarizes the Software Information Industry Association's Software Implementation Toolkit to help educational institutions implement worthwhile software in a systematic way. The toolkit provides users with several worksheets that are beneficial for any implementation process. This presentation also provides you with a link to the actual 55-page document. | |
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| Web 2.0 Tools for Busy Administrators In this 11 minute presentation, author and consultant Susan Brooks-Young provides a quick overview of what Web 2.0 is and then shares a concrete example of how a group of educators in Northern California used an on-line group, a wiki, and a "web-top" word processor to help them complete a collaborative planning process. | |
Tools & Templates: Professional Development |
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| Certiport Monthly Feedback Form Developed by Certiport, a technology certification company, this form is a tool the company uses internally to develop critical skills and behaviors in its own workforce. Certiport President and CEO David Saedi has given TICAL permission to share the form as an example of one way to measure certain 21st century skills. | |
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| How To Be Part of TICAL's Interactive Leadership Community This document provides you the steps needed to sign-up, interact, and upload pictures and videos in TICAL's social network on Ning at portical.ning.com. | |
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| How to use Electronic Learning Assessment Resources (ELAR) Web site This tool was designed by the ELAR staff to assist you in navigating the Web site. It was prepared for beginning to advanced users of data-driven resources in hopes of helping you make decisions based on data. This document is broken down by concept, where to find the resource on the site, and a direct URL link. | |
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| Quick Takes: Google Forms This Quick Take shows you how to use Google Forms, a subset of Google Docs, to gather survey data for your data-driven decisions. You will learn how to create your own Google Form and distribute an unlimited amount for free! | |
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| Step Sheets Looking for a tutorial on programs such as Microsoft Office? Chris York, Director of Technology for Del Norte Unified School District, developed these step sheets to help his staff be more productive. You can download and use them as well. Titles include: Beginning Word, Creating Tables, Mail Merge in Word, Excel Quick Start Guide, Using AutoFilter in Excel, Using Publisher, and PowerPoint 101. These tools are useful for administrators, office staff, and classroom teachers. | |
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| Streamlining Lesson Plan Collection Using Google Docs and the SIOP (Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol) Model In this 9-minute tutorial, Jason Borgen steps you through setting up a Google Account, uploading the Excel SIOP lesson plan template, and sharing the template with all your teachers. Now you will be able to collect lesson plan submissions from your teachers on one paperless form, as well as giving you and your teachers the opportunity to quickly view lessons and assess which SIOP strategies are being used. The lesson plan template is also provided here. | |
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| TICAL's Top 10 Original Content for Principals This list of resources were developed by TICAL cadre and staff to streamline your leadership and management tasks. These resources are considered the most popular on the TICAL web site. These resources include time planning templates, cyber safety tutorials, bell scheduling templates, and much more. A print version is also available to handout in your meetings. | |
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| Time Planner Whether you’re planning a 90-minute staff meeting or a five-day workshop, this easy-to-use Excel template will help you allot time among the various topics and activities you want to include. Enter your starting and ending times; then, as you add each item, the worksheet automatically calculates how much time you’ve used and how much you have left. Contributed by TICAL Arkansas cadre member George Lieux. | |
Tools & Templates: Technology Planning |
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| A Collaborative School Embracing Digital Media In this TICALevision episode, hear from Jennifer Wildman and her staff at Landmark Elementary School in Pajaro Valley Elementary School on how integrating Flip cameras have increased teacher effectiveness by providing teachers with videos of their classrooms which aides in the critical evaluation of each others’ methods. | |
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| Acceptable Use Policies One in a series of brief, narrated slide presentations by Harvey Barnett, Senior Research Associate at WestEd. This presentation is 9 minutes long and focuses on why your school needs an acceptable use policy (AUP) and what it should contain. A printable version is also available. | |
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| Align Technology with School Improvement Join TICAL cadre member Kevin Silberberg as he makes a case for the importance of aligning the use of technology with your overall school improvement efforts. Use this short narrated presentation for your own leadership development or as a discussion starter at a principals' meeting. | |
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| Developing a Learning Community For One Laptop Per Child Implementation In this TICALevision episode, George Lieux, Technology Integration Specialist at Fort Smith Public Schools in Fort Smith, Arkansas shares a program that was recently implemented in the district. Several classrooms, from 2nd grade to 12th grade, received a mini-notebook (UMPC) for every student in the classroom. As the lead technology professional development trainer, George highlights how he trains the teachers virtually to model the use of the laptops and to promote project-based learning. | |
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| E-mail Protocol and E-mail Etiquette for Effective Communication In this presentation cadre member Gabe Soumakian focuses on e-mail protocol and etiquette to improve effective communication. He shares proper ways to send group e-mails, manage your e-mails, and how to identify spam. | |
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| EdTechProfile's Radio TICAL Interview EdTechProfile is one of the statewide educational technology services (SETS) funded by the California Department of Education and provided free of charge to California public schools. In this episode, Steve Kay talks with Brian Dunsmore, EdTechProfile’s director, about ways you can use EdTechProfile in your technology planning process. | |
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| Ethical Use of Technology and Internet Safety For Your Technology Plan In this 10 minute presentation, Harvey Barnett shares information and resources about cyber safety and ethical use including plagiarism, copyright, and file sharing. These are important topics to include in your technology planning process. In fact, they are now required in California after the passage of Assembly Bill 307. | |
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| Going Paperless In this Radio TICAL episode, Gabe Soumakian, Assistant Superintendent of Human Resource in Burbank Unified School District got a chance to speak with Stephen Kay for a second time regarding how Burbank USD is implementing several programs to assist their district’s 21st century vision. In this episode Gabe shares the various ways the district is transitioning to a paperless environment for documents, student and personnel records, and surveying. | |
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| Learning and Living in an Online World Internet use has changed. Increasingly, our students are using the Internet for social purposes, not simply to look up information or buy things. School administrators have to worry about more than filtering out inappropriate content; they have to add cyber safety to the course of instruction. In this episode of Radio TICAL, Susan Brooks-Young offers ideas for how you can meet these safety challenges without giving up valuable instructional uses of the Internet. | |
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| Mini Computers for Every Student in the Classroom In this Radio TICAL episode, Arkansas cadre members Harry Dickens, John Calaway, and Jim Yeager speak to George Lieux, an Arkansas cadre member and technology integration specialist at Forth Smith Public Schools about his districts one laptop per child program including how it was funded, how the district provided professional development, how teachers have changed the way they teach, and how the program will be expanded in the future. | |
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| Planning for 1:1 In this Radio TICAL episode hear Eileen Lento, K-12 education strategist at Intel, talk about some of the critical aspects of the planning process for moving to anytime, anywhere, anyway learning in a ubiquitous, one-to-one computing environment. | |
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| Planning for Funding and Budget Harvey Barnett explains key factors to consider when you develop a budget for your technology plan. | |
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| Primer on Copyright Law and Fair Use In this narrated slideshow, attorney Melissa M. McGann explains just what copyright is and how to determine if a use of a copyrighted work is fair use or not. Part of TICAL's Legal Issues series. | |
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| Quick Take: Apple's iPod Touch in Education In this 6-minute narrated presentation Susan Brooks-Young provides an overview of the iPod Touch and how it can be used in and out of the classroom for learning and management purposes. | |
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| Software Licensing In this narrated slideshow, attorney Melissa M. McGann explains how to ensure that the software in your district is used legally and ethically by staff and students. Part of TICAL's Legal Issues series. | |
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| Systemic Improvement Using Netbooks - Part 1 of 2 Fort Smith Public Schools in Fort Smith, AR, implemented a 1:1 program with netbooks in several junior high and high school classrooms to create a more student-centered and project-based focus. Spearheaded by the district’s Professional Development Center, emphasis was first placed on changing the pedagogical paradigm. In this first of two part TICALevision episode, professional development director, Dr. Kathleen Cates, discusses the intensive professional development program, teachers share how the netbooks (mini laptops) encourage student engagement, and you will see students learning at their own pace. | |
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| Taking Control of Email Presentation In this narrated presentation Devin Vodicka provides a sequence of steps and offers resources that will help school leaders to take control of email, increase their efficiency, and improve their effectiveness. You will be free of email overload after you view this presentation. | |
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| The Future of Ubiquitous Computing – Zero Cost Licensing with Open Source In this Radio TICAL episode, the Director of CoSN’s K-12 Open Technologies Initiative, Steve Hargadon, shares an overview and the benefits of adopting open source software in your schools. | |
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| Using iPods to Turn Students On To Reading (Part 1 of 2) The eCAP program at El Crystal Elementary School in the San Bruno Park School District is a unique take home audiobook program where 40 targeted students use iPods to listen to and read from several different literature books. In this TICALevision episode principal Skip Johnson and several teachers and students share the program and explain how the program has increased student achievement and motivation to read. Stay tuned for Part 2 to learn how to set up a program like this in your school or district! | |
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| Using iPods to Turn Students On To Reading (Part 2 of 2) In this second part of a TICALevision episode you will see how El Crystal elementary school has been able to sustain the eCAP program, a take home audiobook program, for several months. You will hear how principal Skip Johnson and his teachers set-up a training program where the upper grade students trained the younger students. You will also see how easy it is to quickly add audiobooks to the iPods. Lastly, you will hear some ideas Mr. Johnson has to extend this program in the future. | |
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| Using Twitter to Highlight Classroom Effectiveness In this presentation, TICAL cadre member Kevin Silberberg shares how, as superintendent, he uses a cell phone and Twitter to communicate his positive classroom observations to the community. | |
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| Web 2.0 Tools for Busy Administrators In this 11 minute presentation, author and consultant Susan Brooks-Young provides a quick overview of what Web 2.0 is and then shares a concrete example of how a group of educators in Northern California used an on-line group, a wiki, and a "web-top" word processor to help them complete a collaborative planning process. | |
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| What to do with all those morning emails? In our inaugural TICALevision episode, TICAL Director Rowland Baker speaks with Principal in Fresno Unified Jack Jarvis on how he manages email amongst all his other duties in Fresno Unified. Jack shares his simple strategy that is effective. | |